UW Today » Buildings and groundshttp://www.washington.edu/news
Thu, 08 Dec 2016 21:05:50 +0000en-UShourly1http://wordpress.org/?v=4.3.1Completed boardwalk trail in Yesler Swamp offers access to wildlife, natural areashttp://www.washington.edu/news/2016/10/26/completed-boardwalk-trail-in-yesler-swamp-offers-access-to-wildlife-natural-areas/
http://www.washington.edu/news/2016/10/26/completed-boardwalk-trail-in-yesler-swamp-offers-access-to-wildlife-natural-areas/#commentsWed, 26 Oct 2016 18:59:23 +0000http://www.washington.edu/news/?p=50357Yesler Swamp, part of the Union Bay Natural Area along Lake Washington that is managed by UW Botanic Gardens, has a newly completed, fully handicapped-accessible boardwalk trail that loops throughout the wetland, offering opportunities for birdwatching, exercise and a chance to experience nature in the heart of the city.

A segment of the new boardwalk.Wendy Gibble/UW

Restoration work on the 6-acre swamp began more than 15 years ago as part of a UW capstone course taught by Kern Ewing, a professor in environmental and forest sciences. The swamp was overrun with invasive plants, including reed canary grass and English ivy, and a stronghold of Himalayan blackberry made most of the area impassable.

After mowing down some of the blackberry thickets, Ewing decided to try a less mechanical approach: Plant young, fast-growing willow trees to cast shade on the sun-loving invasives and eventually kill them.

Those initial plantings took hold, grew tall and served as a starting point for robust restoration work. Now, swamp-loving conifers and other native shrubs thrive in the area that has far fewer invasive plants than a decade ago.

“I think people assume a natural area will just heal itself, but in a city, that just doesn’t happen,” Ewing said. “There’s always going to be some restoration needed in Yesler Swamp. It’s great, because we wanted a project that would have an ongoing need, and to involve students in meeting that need.”

Swamps are wetlands with trees, and conifers such as Sitka spruce and western red cedar would have colonized the Yesler Swamp area. Most of Seattle’s original swamps have been logged, drained or filled, and this swamp is one of the only remaining ones along Lake Washington.

“This swamp provides a habitat type that’s rare,” said Zac Mallon, a recent UW graduate who helped with the restoration work. “It provides habitat for wetland birds, migrating salmon and other fish species and amphibians in the Seattle area.”

About five years ago, the swamp’s Laurelhurst neighbors formed the group Friends of Yesler Swamp and began the boardwalk trail project that protects sensitive habitat and keeps walkers’ feet dry when the lake level rises. The boardwalk trail also makes it easier to do ongoing restoration work.

The view from Yesler Swamp.Wendy Gibble/UW

The group raised more than $400,000 to build the 1,500-foot boardwalk, designed by SB&A Landscape Architects. The UW will now assume responsibility for ongoing maintenance and monitoring restoration work within the swamp.

“It is wonderful that the Friends of Yesler Swamp wanted to take on the trail and boardwalk project,” said Fred Hoyt, interim director of UW Botanic Gardens. “It is providing all-year access for the students to work on projects, learn how to deal with restoration and report to the state agencies. The area is an excellent outdoor laboratory that allows us to work hand in hand with the community on a range of activities.”

Hundreds of students have been involved over the years in work parties and research projects in Yesler Swamp. UW students, local elementary school and high school students have taken their turn at pulling out invasives. A number of UW graduate students also have completed thesis projects using the swamp as a convenient test bed.

An overlook section of the boardwalk.Wendy Gibble/UW

“For UW students, this is a place to run experiments, to learn about restoration and to try new things,” said Kat Cerny-Chipman, a UW master’s student in environmental and forest sciences. “It’s a forever project, but since this is a place to learn about restoration, that’s actually OK.”

Henry Yesler’s 1800s-era sawmill used to occupy the land now known as the swamp. After the mill burned down, the UW bought the property in 1927 and it sat for years, accumulating a dense, impassable thicket of invasive plants. Now the land is teeming with native plants, a resident beaver (and dam) and more than 100 bird species sightings.

“Because the swamp was forgotten is why we can have this resource now,” Cerny-Chipman said. “I think the specialness of the swamp is really hard to put into words. I encourage people to get out and see it.”

The University of Washington’s Population Health Initiative, which aims to bring together the research and resources of the UW and partners around the Puget Sound and beyond to improve the health and well-being of people around the world, has received a significant vote of support from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the university announced Tuesday.

In May, the UW launched an initiative to develop a 25-year vision to improve population health locally and globally by focusing on three key areas: human health, environmental resiliency, and social and economic equity. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has awarded a $210 million gift that will serve as a catalyst for the vision, funding construction of a new building to house several UW units working in population health, as well as serving as a place for faculty, students and collaborators from the many university departments and global partners that are part of the effort to come together in their work.

“Melinda and I are pleased to make this investment in the University of Washington to help dramatically accelerate their 25-year vision to achieve positive health outcomes for populations around the world. UW has long been a partner in our foundation’s global health and development efforts and this grant underscores our confidence in the school’s students, faculty and multi-disciplinary resources to advance their Population Health Initiative,” Bill Gates said.

The UW’s Population Health Initiative recognizes that the health of an individual or a community involves more than just the absence of disease. Issues from poverty and equity, to health care access, to climate change and government policies all combine to affect the health and well-being of populations around the world, creating health disparities between countries and even within communities. The initiative builds on the UW’s public mission of service to improve health around the world.

“We believe we have a moral imperative to bring together the tremendous knowledge and resources of the UW and the Puget Sound region and channel them towards improving health and well-being here in Washington and around the world,” UW President Ana Mari Cauce said. “We are grateful and honored to receive this generous support from the Gates Foundation, which recognizes that the UW is among a small subset of institutions equipped to tackle the health challenges we face on a global scale.”

Over the next quarter century, the Population Health Initiative will expand the UW’s ability to turn the diagnosis of patients, populations and the planet into actionable policies, reforms, interventions and innovations. The University will strengthen its commitment to reducing the diseases, afflictions, and health disparities that detract from and shorten the lives of far too many people both locally and globally. Recognizing that factors such as air pollution and access to clean water contribute to health disparities, the UW will work toward ways to meet the challenge of environmental sustainability, particularly in those communities most likely to be harmed by climate change. And the UW will strive to address the social and economic inequities that often leave communities here and around the world mired in poverty and poor health.

The new building will serve as a hub for collaboration on population health across a range of disciplines at the University. When completed, it will house the Department of Global Health, Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation, and portions of the School of Public Health – all of which are currently spread out in various locations across Seattle – and provide a central gathering place for partners from around the University, region and world. The location of the building has not yet been determined. However, several sites on the main Seattle campus are under active consideration.

The Gates Foundation gift is among the largest single contributions in the UW’s history and will dramatically accelerate the 25-year vision of collaboration among diverse fields in the health sciences and beyond, including education, engineering, environmental sciences, law, the arts, humanities, social sciences, business and others.

The gift comes at a time when the University is launching its most ambitious philanthropic campaign in its history, “Be Boundless — For Washington, For the World,” aimed at transforming lives and expanding opportunity. The campaign launched on Oct. 21 and seeks to raise $5 billion by 2020.

A tree wraps its branches around the concrete pillars of one of the ramps not built due to the freeway revolt. Minda Martin of UW Bothell is directing a documentary film about the protest.Minda Martin

Minda Martin had not lived in Seattle long before, on a walking tour, she noticed the famously truncated “ramps to nowhere” in the Washington Park Arboretum. A filmmaker and faculty member at UW Bothell, she was fascinated — and inspired.

“I was stunned by these giant freeway stumps covered in ivy along land that didn’t seem to belong to anyone,” said Martin, who moved to Seattle in 2013. “But it was clearly important to a large variety of folks who spent time here.

“While photographing the stumps, I learned about the history of the freeway revolt that stopped partially and fully funded freeways such as the R.H. Thompson Expressway almost 50 years ago and the 20 freeways that had been drawn on maps, but never completed. The history and the site made me want to make a film.”

From that inspiration comes “Seattle’s Freeway Revolt: A Living Legacy of Civic Activism,” a documentary film and multimedia web archive about the successful late 1960s and early 1970s grassroots movement opposing those freeways in Seattle, which Martin is creating with colleagues Anna Rudd and Priscilla Arsove.

Minda Martin

Martin is an associate professor in UW Bothell’s School of Interdisciplinary Arts & Sciences who teaches classes titled Gender in Film, World Cinema, the Essay Film, the City as Character and Documentary Production. She also makes experimental documentary films. “My work is intended to inspire the viewer to look beyond dominant histories and call for more multivocal approaches to history,” she writes on her web page.

Martin soon met members of Re-Collective, a group that calls itself “architects, designers, thinkers and tinkerers working in the urban landscape of Seattle,” whose members in 2014 turned the truncated ramp into a public art installation called the Gate to Nowhere.

Associations with Re-Collective led her to meet members of the group Activists Remembered, Celebrated and Honored. She also met Arsove, the daughter of UW math professor Maynard Arsove — an important figure in the freeway revolt and founder of the activist group Citizens Against RH Thompson — as well as Rudd, his neighbor and a fellow activist. Rudd and Arsove coordinated interviews with activists of the era and became producers of the film and archive project.

The project, Martin said, is a video documentary and multimedia web archive that preserves the history of the movement through short video interviews with former activists, politicians and others involved at the time as well as images, information on the planned freeways and even audio recordings of citizen testimony against the development.

Martin’s “multivocal” approach to history seems to fit the documentary well; the trailer for the documentary has audio clips of activists remembering the movement.

“There was this big map on the wall, and it was the Seattle transportation plan, and I started looking at it and I thought, this has got to be a joke — it can’t be serious,” one person is heard recalling. “It had this dense network of freeways and bridges. At least 15 freeways within Seattle.”

The project is being supported with funding from the Simpson Center for the Humanities. Martin said the documentary will be complete in January 2017 and the archive website in September.

The new 130,000-square-foot UW CSE building will provide space for the University of Washington to double the number of computer science and engineering graduates annually.LMN Architects

Amazon is giving a major push to the campaign to build a second Computer Science & Engineering building on the University of Washington campus with a $10 million gift, the university announced Thursday.

“Our state’s economy — and the world’s economy — depends on innovation and on innovators. UW graduates with skills in computer science are highly sought after, yet we are turning away excellent students who want to pursue studies in the field because we simply don’t have enough room,” said UW President Ana Mari Cauce. “This generous gift from Amazon brings us closer to doubling our capacity and allows us to better meet both student and workplace needs, which will benefit our state and nation.”

Give to the Campaign for UW CSE

Support efforts to advance the future of computer science and engineering at the UW by making a donation here.

A long-time supporter of the University of Washington’s Computer Science and Engineering programs, Amazon’s gift is a significant boost in the UW’s public-private partnership to raise $110 million for a new 130,000-square-foot building. The new building will provide the space needed for UW to double, to more than 600, the number of degrees awarded annually by the Department of Computer Science & Engineering (CSE).

“The University of Washington is a world-class institution, and we are lucky to have thousands of UW graduates inventing and pioneering in Seattle – including right here at Amazon,” said Jeff Bezos, founder and CEO of Amazon. “We’re proud to support UW as they expand their computer science program, which will benefit the whole community.”

The 250-seat Amazon Auditorium and Gallery will be one of many new features that enhance the UW CSE student experience. Other key elements of the building include classrooms and educational labs, a sophisticated maker space, an undergraduate commons where students can study and collaborate, and research labs, including a 3,000-square-foot robotics lab.

The 250-seat Amazon Auditorium and Gallery will be one of many new features that enhance the UW CSE student experience.LMN Architects

The gift is only the latest way in which Amazon has supported the UW. For example, in 2012 Amazon established two $1 million endowed professorships in CSE — the Amazon Professorships in Machine Learning — to assist in recruiting two highly sought-after machine learning faculty members. The company also launched the Amazon Catalyst program — a collaboration with select universities aimed at identifying, funding and supporting bold, risky, globally impactful projects — at the UW last fall.

“Over the past 20 years, Amazon has grown into one of the leading and most innovative companies in the world, UW CSE has grown into one of the leading and most innovative computer science programs in the world, and Seattle has grown into one of the one of the leading and most innovative technology hubs in the world,” said Ed Lazowska, UW’s Bill & Melinda Gates Chair in Computer Science & Engineering. “Amazon’s gift will help make it possible for UW CSE to prepare more of Washington’s students for careers in Washington’s booming technology sector. It’s an investment in our collective future.”

Join us to kick off the largest philanthropic campaign in UW history on Oct. 21.

The new UW CSE building was designed to benefit students with new classrooms, a sophisticated maker space, research labs and a multitude of spaces to encourage formal and informal collaborationLMN Architects

According to the Washington Student Achievement Council, the workforce gap in computer science – the gap between available jobs and prepared graduates – is far greater than in any other field. At the UW, student demand far outstrips program capacity: more incoming UW freshmen list CSE as their first choice major than any other field, and UW CSE currently can accommodate just one out of three qualified students who apply to the major. In addition, students in all fields recognize the value of a basic knowledge of computer science, so the demand is even greater – in the most recent year, 5,000 students enrolled in UW CSE’s introductory courses.

“Amazon is a global company, but it’s also a Seattle company,” said Hank Levy, UW CSE’s Wissner-Slivka Chair and department chair. “We are extremely thankful to Amazon for their support of UW CSE, and for the amazing impact they’ve had on Seattle and on the world.”

Seattle-based LMN Architects are designing the building with a goal to break ground in January 2017 and open in 2019.

]]>http://www.washington.edu/news/2016/10/06/cse-gets-major-boost-with-10-million-donation-from-amazon/feed/0Building ‘up not out’: Draft UW Campus Master Plan for 2018 now seeking public inputhttp://www.washington.edu/news/2016/10/05/building-up-not-out-uw-campus-master-plan-for-2018-now-seeking-public-input/
http://www.washington.edu/news/2016/10/05/building-up-not-out-uw-campus-master-plan-for-2018-now-seeking-public-input/#commentsWed, 05 Oct 2016 18:46:56 +0000http://www.washington.edu/news/?p=50000A new proposed draft Campus Master Plan for 2018 sees the University of Washington’s Seattle campus growing up rather than out — building a little higher, filling in with more density, not expanding its borders, helping to ease transportation flow and creating big new green spaces.

The Campus Master Plan Advisory Committee and Working Group have done their job — in tandem with the City of Seattle and many area stakeholders — laying out proposed campus development from 2018 through 2028.

The plan is being published Oct. 5. Now it’s time for the public and the campus community to give their input in a series of in-person and online meetings between Oct. 12 and Nov. 2. Comments on the plan are being accepted until Nov. 21.

These include open houses from noon to 2 p.m. Oct. 18 in Haggett Hall and from 7 to 9 p.m. Oct. 20 in the UW Tower Mezzanine Auditorium, as well as a separate State Environmental Policy Act (SEPA) Public Hearing to consider the project’s Environmental Impact Statement from 6:30 to 9 p.m. Oct. 26, also at the UW Tower.

Online versions of both open houses also will be held, as well as informal “office hours” meetings — where people are invited to discuss plan specifics in person — at three coffee shops in the area.

“I think the headline here is that the university is planning for an increase in faculty, staff and students and responding to collaborative ways of teaching and learning that need larger and different types of spaces,” said Theresa Doherty, senior project director for the plan.

“By building up instead of out, we can create a more sustainable plan with more open spaces that are a real amenity not only to faculty and staff and students, but to our residential and business community in the University District as well.”

The 2018 Campus Master Plan identifies 85 different potential development sites that represent a maximum development potential of 12.9 million gross square feet campuswide of which 6 million will be developed over the life of the plan. Gross square footage means the total square footage of the land and what is built there.

The development is designed to accommodate an expected student enrollment increase of 20 percent from 2014 to 2028. The projected increase of 8,675 FTE, or full-time equivalents, would translate to 52,400 students by 2028, as well as increasing teaching and research demands, future transportation needs and overall economic growth.

The plan also has the potential to create several new parks and green areas for public use, Doherty said: “We’re creating a large new park that would connect to the city’s Portage Bay park along Boat Street, a new open space on South Campus, a large new land bridge with open space on the East Campus and a waterfront trail that can connect to SR 520. These will all enhance our current open spaces and make it easier and more pleasant to traverse campus.”

Each site also includes a maximum allowable height limit. Building heights vary across campus, from 30 feet along the waterfront to 240 feet in South Campus. Many older buildings were constructed at heights lower than what is being proposed, so such sites have the potential for additional capacity.

West Campus

An illustration of changes proposed for the UW’s West Campus area in the 2018 Campus Master Plan.Sasaki Associates

Perhaps the biggest changes will be seen at West Campus, the most urban part of the four areas, which accommodates varied building uses from research to retail, plus student housing, cultural programs and transit services. This area also is, authors of the plan state, “uniquely positioned” to become an inclusive innovation district for the broader Seattle region.

New student housing and improvements along Northeast Campus Parkway, plan authors write, provide a good mix of programmatic amenities and open space — but other areas remain “underdeveloped and grittier in character.”

On West Campus a total of 3 million gross square feet is planned for development, as well as a large, triangular park area reaching from Northeast Pacific Street to Portage Bay along the water creating a new open space the size of Parrington Lawn. The plan calls for the long-term future of West Campus to be “envisioned with a rich new open space network that reinforces its diverse urban context and enhances the pedestrian experience throughout the area.”

South Campus

An illustration of changes proposed for the UW’s South Campus area in the 2018 Campus Master Plan.Sasaki Associates

The UW’s South Campus supports its health sciences functions, six health sciences schools and the medical center along a 2 ¼-mile waterfront and is home to academic, research and clinical areas for the schools as well as assorted environmental and natural settings. “Its monolithic structure is dense and disorienting both inside and out,” the Campus Master Plan’s authors write.

The 2018 plan proposes incremental remaking of much of the health sciences complex, totaling 1,350,000 gross square feet of new development. The plan seeks to reduce the scale of development in South Campus “in a manner that promotes school identity, orientation and connectivity” and to “leverage and celebrate” its waterfront location with a shared campus green, courtyards and upper terraces.

A continuous waterfront trail with a public access plan is also envisioned for South Campus, as well as improved access to West, Central and East campuses through enhanced pedestrian connections.

Central Campus

An illustration of changes proposed for the UW’s Central Campus area in the 2018 Campus Master Plan.Sasaki Associates

The UW’s Central Campus, home of the Husky Union Building and many historical academic core buildings, will see 900,000 gross square feet of new development in the 2018 master plan. The aim, plan authors write, is to preserve and enhance the historic core of campus.

The plan proposes a new land bridge from Mason Road by Fluke Hall over the Burke-Gilman Trail and Northeast Montlake Boulevard to new development opportunities on the current E-1 parking lot and Golf Driving Range. Valuable sightlines to Rainer Vista, Union Bay, Mt. Rainier and Portage Bay will be preserved and strengthened.

East Campus

An illustration of changes proposed for the UW’s East Campus area in the 2018 Campus Master Plan.Sasaki Associates

Plans for the East Campus area, now hosting athletics and recreational activities and parking for campus commuters, will see 750,000 gross square feet of new development in the plan. The intent, plan authors state, is to preserve athletics uses while “transforming existing parking lots into future academic, research and potential partnership spaces.”

The plan aims to strengthen connections between Central and East campus with new development and universally accessible pedestrian walkways. Development is planned in a way to complement the forested edge along Central Campus and discourage the formation of a street wall along Montlake Avenue.

It’s time for a new campus plan because by 2018 the university expects it will have developed almost all of the 3 million gross square feet of space in the last plan, which was approved in 2003.

The process of creating a new plan began in 2015 with a team that worked with consultants Sasaki Associates to assess the university’s expected needs over the next decade — from enrollment growth and greater teaching and research demands to economic expansion and future transportation needs and the evolving needs of the campus community itself.

The plan process is guided by the 1998 City University Agreement between the UW and the City of Seattle. Both the Board of Regents and the Seattle City Council must approve the plan before it can be implemented. The project is co-led by Doherty and University Architect Rebecca Barnes, who is also associate vice provost for capital and campus planning.

Creation of the 2018 Campus Master Plan was guided by five basic principles: providing a flexible framework for growth, supporting learning-based academic and research partnerships, sustainable development, connectivity, and stewardship of historic and cultural resources.

“We hope that the University community will take a few minutes now to give us their feedback. We want this plan to work for the people that are here now and those that we hope to attract in the future,” said Doherty. “This plan is going to guide us into the next decade and beyond — so we really want to get it right!”

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For more information on the 2018 Campus Master Plan — and to give input — attend a public or online meeting, or contact Doherty at 206-221-2603 or tdoherty@uw.edu.

]]>http://www.washington.edu/news/2016/10/05/building-up-not-out-uw-campus-master-plan-for-2018-now-seeking-public-input/feed/0The Great UW ShakeOut: An opportunity to practice earthquake preparednesshttp://www.washington.edu/news/2016/09/14/the-great-uw-shakeout-an-opportunity-to-practice-earthquake-preparedness/
http://www.washington.edu/news/2016/09/14/the-great-uw-shakeout-an-opportunity-to-practice-earthquake-preparedness/#commentsWed, 14 Sep 2016 21:17:56 +0000http://www.washington.edu/news/?p=49581All across the world, millions of people will be practicing their earthquake preparedness on Oct. 20. The event — called the Great ShakeOut — will commence at 10:20 a.m. for those participating at the University of Washington and across the state. It is an opportunity for people to practice what they should do in the event of an earthquake: Drop, cover and hold on.

The simplest way to participate is to practice “drop, cover and hold on” at 10:20 a.m. on Oct. 20. This can be done by using the building’s public address (PA) system to alert occupants of the preceding drill (contact your building coordinator for details). If you don’t have access to your PA system, or some departments in your building are not participating, choose a team member to use whistles or a blow horn to alert department members that “This is an earthquake drill! Drop, cover and hold on!”

In addition to practicing the above activity, some departments may also add a building evacuation drill to their earthquake drill. But be mindful that your earthquake evacuation location is not always the same location as your fire evacuation location. Furthermore, evacuation after an earthquake is not always necessary.

Some departments will take this time to also review any and all emergency plans as a team. UW Emergency Management can help tailor almost any training to a department’s specific needs.

For more information, contact UW Emergency Management at (206) 897-8000 or disaster@uw.edu.

Justin Camputaro, with more than 15 years of experience in higher education administration, joined the University of Washington as the new director of the Husky Union Building, effective July 18.

“I could not be more excited about Justin taking on the role of director of the Husky Union Building,” said Lincoln Johnson, associate vice president for UW Student Life. “Having been a part of its leadership for 20 years, I can vouch for the drive, passion, and commitment of its staff and student leadership. Justin will bring a high level of leadership, motivation, and discernment to the position.”

Johnson started as director of the HUB in 1996 and later took on additional responsibilities, making him the associate vice president for Student Life. Camputaro will take over Johnson’s responsibilities as HUB director.

Most recently, Camputaro served as director of Student Centers and Activity for more than three years at Virginia Tech where he led and managed the institution’s three student centers, the university chapel and various other units on campus.

Prior to that, Camputaro was the director of the student union at the University of North Florida, managing the operation of its Student Union building.

“This is a great time to be working at the University of Washington and the HUB,” Camputaro said. “It is an honor to join an incredible team of professionals and student leaders as the HUB begins its fifth year after the most recent major renovation. I am excited be a part of visioning and creating memorable and life-changing experiences for our Husky students and colleagues.”

As director, Camputaro will provide overall leadership, supervision and management of the HUB. He will work with student leaders and university staff to create and implement a creative and strategic vision for the HUB.

]]>http://www.washington.edu/news/2016/08/02/justin-camputaro-named-director-of-the-husky-union-building-at-uw/feed/0Burke Museum breaks ground on new building for Washington state museumhttp://www.washington.edu/news/2016/05/19/burke-museum-breaks-ground-on-new-building-for-washington-state-mus/
http://www.washington.edu/news/2016/05/19/burke-museum-breaks-ground-on-new-building-for-washington-state-mus/#commentsThu, 19 May 2016 22:45:06 +0000http://www.washington.edu/news/?p=48037

Scene from the groundbreaking ceremony for the New Burke.Burke Museum of History & Culture

More than 500 people gathered May 18 on the University of Washington campus to celebrate the start of construction on the New Burke Museum. The Burke is Washington’s oldest museum and since 1899 has been the State Museum of Natural History and Culture; soon it will be Washington’s newest museum.
Opening in 2019, the New Burke will address significant issues in the current structure that threaten the long-term viability of our state’s natural and cultural heritage collections — a total of more than 16 million objects. The new 113,000-square-foot building, located on the UW campus, will be 66 percent larger than the current building. State-of-the-art labs will serve more students, researchers and artists. Education space will allow the Burke to potentially double the number of pre-K and K-12 students served each year.

“The new facility with allow us to take science and cultural education to the next level by connecting students with the scientists and researchers at the Burke — role models who will inspire the next generation,” said Frank Chopp, D-Seattle, speaker of the state House of Representatives. “Washington is a state of innovation and curiosity. It is only right that our state museum helps foster that in our young learners and in all of us.”

The New Burke will have an innovative “inside-out” design, integrating exhibits and learning areas with visible labs and collections throughout the museum, inviting everyone to uncover the depth and breadth of the museum’s collections and experience the thrill of discoveries generated at the Burke.

At the groundbreaking event, Washington educators, elected officials, tribal members and UW leaders spoke about the impact of the New Burke. Students from the University Temple Children’s School — located across the street from the site of the New Burke — joined project donors and officials for the ceremonial groundbreaking.

UW President Ana Mari Cauce congratulated the Burke on reaching this important milestone and thanked supporters of the project, adding, “We are very excited to break ground and look forward to working together with the community and the state Legislature to get the project finished.”

The budget for the New Burke project is $99 million, which includes design and construction of the new building, exhibits, moving costs, an operating endowment, and landscaping for the new facility. To date, $67 million in public and private support has been raised. The Burke will continue to raise private funds and will request $24.2 million from the State of Washington in 2017.

“The Burke is the State Natural History Museum. It’s the oldest state museum and we have an obligation, I believe, to create a new facility to protect our natural heritage,” said Sen. Jim Honeyford, R-Sunnyside.

“The Legislature worked closely with the UW to make this day happen and we are working together to get this project done,” said Rep. Steve Tharinger, D-Sequim.

Plans for the New Burke were developed over many years, in consultation with museum experts and members of the communities the Burke Museum serves.

In the coming years, the Burke will continue to consult with diverse community groups about the exhibits and education programs being developed for the New Burke.

“As we move forward, let’s remember all of the relationships and good work that happened here in the current building, and have that be the foundation of what happens in the new museum,” said Leonard Forsman, chairman of the Suquamish Tribe.

The current Burke Museum will be torn down after the New Burke opens, with farewell celebrations taking place in the current building in early 2019. Special exhibits, events and educational programs will continue in the current Burke throughout construction.

“I am thrilled to celebrate a major moment for the New Burke: breaking ground on the new, flagship museum of natural history and culture for Washington state,” said Julie Stein, Burke Museum executive director. “This project is a true partnership, and today is an opportunity for us to recognize the hard work and contributions of everyone who helped us reach this milestone. Together, we will bring the New Burke to life for everyone.”

Visitors learn about UW Libraries’ new Conservation Center, in Suzzallo Library, during an April Friends of the Library tour.

UW Libraries invites the public and the campus community to take a behind-the-scenes look at its new state-of-the-art Conservation Center on the fifth floor of Suzzallo Library, from 3:30 to 5 p.m. Wednesday, May 25.

Space is limited, so those interested are asked to register online by May 18. Light refreshments will be served.

Library staff will lead tours of the new facility and show examples of the rare books, manuscripts, maps and drawings they are working to preserve for future generations. The new center will dramatically increase the libraries’ capacity to care for the many fragile and rare books, manuscripts, maps and drawings held in its Special Collections area.

This conservation work supports the mission of UW Libraries to provide stewardship and access to its collection. The center also complements commercial binding and preservation services to give the most appropriate treatment to each item that need it.

Every year staff in the UW Libraries mendery repair, bind or make enclosures for 10,000 to 12,000 items, preserving, stabilizing or fully restoring the usability of books and paper materials.

Thanks to a grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation in 2012, UW Libraries was able to hire a senior conservator for books and paper. UW Libraries is continuing to fundraise for the challenge portion of the grant.

Where do you walk on campus after dark, and which areas could benefit from better lighting?

An interdisciplinary team of students, faculty and staff together with lighting design experts is asking the UW community those questions as part of a new plan to improve the efficiency and sustainability of outdoor lighting around the Seattle campus. The team’s survey to campus includes an interactive map for respondents to place markers and comments related to outdoor lighting and how the campus is experienced when it is dark.

“The roadmap will envision a campus that is lit as a legible whole, with lighting that transitions between campus spaces in a way that promotes logical wayfinding and creates a comfortable nighttime environment,” said Kelly Douglas, a UW graduate student in landscape architecture and project team member.

“The project will also prioritize ecological systems that may be impacted by nighttime lighting and seeks to employ measures that mitigate disruption to wildlife habitat and patterns.”

An HDR imaging analysis of a Rainier Vista crossing. This is one type of analysis the project team will perform.Integrated Design Lab

Outdoor lighting has come a long way in recent years. Project organizers cite many new options — digital sensing controls that respond to the presence or absence of people, or light levels that vary depending on how busy an area is — to replace standard, inefficient lights.

Additionally, some LEDs can be tuned to a whiter light with higher color-rendering ability to foster a comparable sense of safety as conventional lights — but consume half the power.

“New lighting technologies and strategies have the potential to radically decrease the amount of energy consumed by exterior lighting on campus,” Douglas said. “By addressing lighting as an overall program, rather than a project-by-project consideration, the roadmap will serve as an actionable tool for the implementation of new, more sustainable lighting across campus.”

Other members of the project team are Christopher Meek, director of the UW Integrated Design Lab and an associate professor of architecture; Eric Strandberg of Seattle’s Lighting Design Lab; and Kristine Kenney and Patrick Pirtle of the Office of the University Architect.

The survey is available online and will remain open through midsummer. All UW students, faculty and staff are encouraged to participate.